The invention is related to exterior doors utilized in commercial and residential buildings. More specifically, the invention is related to an exterior pocket door that includes a door frame structure that holds two active sliding pocket door units configured to slide within pocket door receiving spaces provided within the door frame structure.
There are a number of conventional sliding doors that are and have been utilized as exterior doors in commercial and residential construction. U.S. Pat. No. 6,438,912, for example, discloses a conventional sliding door assembly that utilizes two fixed units that are fitted to an aperture of a building or a doorway, and two sliding units that are fitted to the interior of the building such that they can slide backwards and forwards behind the fixed units. In general, both the fixed units and the sliding units include glass panels in conventional sliding or patio doors to maximize window surface area. It is desirable in certain architectural designs, however, to maximize the amount of available interior wall space available. Accordingly, in such cases, it is not desirable to utilize a conventional door structure in which the fixed panels are glass as in the above-described example. Further, even if the fixed units in the above-referenced patent are made from solid panels, the glass sliding units still slide behind the fixed units rendering the interior wall surface unusable.
Other conventional sliding doors simply utilize a single sliding unit that slides in front of a fixed unit, both of which are made of glass. While this solves the problem of having the sliding unit obstruct an interior wall surface, the design fails to utilize the full space available to have a door opening. In other words, if the available glass surface area is six feet, such doors employ a three foot sliding door that slides behind a three foot fixed unit, whereas it would be desirable to utilize the full available six feet for an opening.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,754,573 attempts to address the problems associated with conventional sliding doors, and particularly the need for reserving room along the interior wall to allow space for a sliding door, by providing a sliding door unit that includes two door cabinets into which two sliding door panels slide into respectively. Similar conventional door units are sometimes referred to as “pocket doors”, because the sliding door panels are hidden within the cabinet or “pocket”. While the disclosed structure does provide some advantages, conventional pocket door structures have been generally been limited to interior building applications.
In view of the above, it would be desirable to provide a pocket door of simple design that could be used for commercial and residential exterior building applications. It would further be desirable to provide an exterior pocket door of modular design that can be easily inserted into an opening provided in a buildings exterior framing.